Submitted by FlashbackBob t3_10et542 in RhodeIsland
Some tax relief in this proposal. Reduce the sales tax to 6.85%, eliminate the litter tax on businesses, eliminate the gross receipts tax on energy bills. Increase aid to education by $57 million.
What do the RI Redditors think of these initiatives?
It’s something that offers no tangible benefit to a person. Even a fairly affluent household that’s spending $100,000 a year on taxable goods and services is saving $150 over the course of a year. And that’s for the super rich, most people don’t spend close to that much.
I’d rather keep the sales tax where it is and let some of the revenue burden by shared by the 25 million or so tourists who come here every year.
If it were up to me, I'd add more sales tax tiers.
Unlike us, CT does normally charge sales tax on clothing but has an annual back-to-school season tax-free week, where clothing under $50/item is tax free. I think it would make perfect sense for us to implement something similar. Instead of all clothing being tax-free all the time, only charge sales tax on individual items over $50 or $100 or something. I see no reason why we need to subsidize higher-end clothing.
Similarly, RI charges the same tax rate on all vehicles but CT has a higher bracket for vehicles over $50,000 (7.75% vs their normal 6.35%). Maybe that dollar limit should be bumped up a bit more for 2023, but I like the idea. No reason the $100,000 Mercedes buyer can't pay a bit more tax. I'd be tempted to add another tier for <$30,000 vehicles to pay lower than normal tax too.
Beyond that, we already have the mechanism in the grocery store that defines what foods are SNAP eligible...the foods that are generally good things to eat. Why not tax the non-SNAP "not good" foods too?
I like it. Hell, we can just copy MA and make groceries tax free outright.
For normal purchases, I’d just go to whatever that Laffer curve number is for the ideal rate. I wanna say it’s around 6.5% or something
> copy MA and make groceries tax free outright.
Food is already tax-free in RI. I am suggesting re-adding sales tax to the not-a-staple foods like aren't SNAP eligible.
> I’d just go to whatever that Laffer curve number is for the ideal rate
That's a new term to me, thanks for bringing it up. Reading about it now though, it seems limited. There is more to taxation than raw receipts, and requiring a single rate seems unnecessary. We could exceed the Laffer ideal if we tax different things at different rates, as well as achieve broader societal goals if we tax the poor less than the wealthy, and encourage eating celery over frozen pizza.
The Laffer curve was debunked 40 years ago. Laffer was a hack economist that was part of the Reagan trickle down squad.
Good to know, thank you
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For other taxes, sure. It’s bullshit. For sales tax, there’s definitely truth to it. There’s a point where the rate gets high enough where revenue will start to drop as consumer habits evolve. This is especially true when 99% could easily go to one of two other states to make purchases.
But for the current example I don't think the laffer curve is in play.
> Why even bother lowering the sales tax rate? I'm certainly not going to notice saving 0.15%, but the state will feel the hit in aggregate.
I believe there is an expectation that some shoppers went to Mass. for a lower rate, and that those shoppers will come back to RI when the rates match. The tax rate would be lower, but an overall increase in shopping tranactions should ultimately boost the annual total taxes collected.
But that's just my guess. *shrug*
Oh good call, yeah that would make sense.
Still makes me wonder what people think their time and gas are worth 0.15%, but to each their own...
People with poor math skills.
The state could at least strike filing taxes through a 3rd party as taxable (seriously turbo tax charges a sales tax for filing here in RI)
Can we also not hire out lobbyist friends for overblown consulting contracts?
b-but think of the poor consultants! they're so valuable! we should be giving them millions to shit out a report that says absolutely nothing you couldn't get from asking a guy on the street for his opinion on a situation!
Excuse me but the guy on the street didn't go to Brown. You can't see very far at the bottom of the hill.
I wonder if new leadership checks this sub? We just had a discussion about the liter around the state.
I can’t believe the state was actually taxing small businesses for a service that wasn’t getting completed.
And what's crazy is that most of the litter you see scattered around our roads and highways is from poor waste management.
From the city not replacing broken bins, dumpsters with no cover and trash trucks either overfilled or with broken load tarps.
I think “we’re going to reduce the litter tax” really misses the mark on just how little revenue that accounted for. Most businesses are paying $100 or less for it.
It seems disingenuous to say “some litter exists, ergo the state does nothing about litter”
I thought the car tax was already gone.
EP was a year behind the rest of the state.
Don't have to pay car tax if you just never re register your car lol oops
People down vote you have never lived in the hood
What were they doing with the litter tax? I know it wasn’t cleaning up litter.
Makes you question a lot of random fees and taxes that just go to the general fund.
The 911 fee was so egregiously misused the federal government stepped it... The state assembly just changed the name of the fee to shut them up.
It’s disgusting how these things work. People are just too blinded to see it by their political affiliations. Questioning the party you identify with and their actions is like questioning the church in the dark ages.
These all seem like decent minor things. As others have pointed out the litter one is pretty interesting, we’ll have to see how that plays out. But there’s nothing in here about housing other than reducing taxes for people with disabilities. No new low cost housing, no new zoning. The gas tax thing is nice I guess but prices dropped after the midterms anyways. At least education is getting some money to it.
I am firmly anti-tax so I will not fault him for reducing taxes (caveat if there are other new taxes so it’s a wash I would complain). I do question why we don’t lower it to compete with Mass. Also it was in the tax law when internet sales began to get taxed the sales tax rate was supposed to go to 6.5% the RI legislation decided not to follow that and struck it from law by passing new legislation to override it.
I am all for all of these initiatives. While $57M isn’t a whole lot in retrospect if it goes towards the public schools in the cities the gap in education will start to narrow and put pressure on the rural public schools to improve to compete with neighboring New England states. Reducing sales tax by 0.15% also is not a lot but it’s a step in the right direction. I don’t know enough about the litter tax in businesses as I do not own my own business. Though I can say as someone that travels often for work RI is one of the cleaner states in the country when it comes to litter. Even our neighbors to the north (check out the area between the highways on 95N/route 3 north of Waltham, it’s literally covered in trash. I often see hawks get hit by cars trying to get it it and it makes me sick. I also support whatever we can do to decrease the cost of energy bills.
I am from CA, and I was appalled by the amount of litter here. I also had never encountered people throwing trash out of their car window until I lived here. It is not a good look when companies are considering opening business here and see communities with so much litter. It is "trashy" (pun intended).
Should have just dumped that 100 million into road repair.
Well, if there is a surplus how about a tax refund to hard working Rhode Islanders? Lowering the sales tax .15%? Hello? Lower it back to where it was pre debtco crisis, after all the sale tax hike of 1% was only implemented as a temporary measure to bail out the credit unions back in the early 90s. Aid to education, sure pay for it with the cannabis tax make sure that money doesn’t end up in the general fund black hole.
you want to really fix the budget? significantly curtail the general fund. make as many sources of tax revenue supply specific budgets as possible. the less that gets swept up into that giant corrupt pit the better
A lot of talk and no action.
At the risk of sounding like a "taxation is theft" type, sales tax and income tax should be 0.0% in every state. That is pure robbery taxing someone on for their work snd what they purchase with what is left for them.
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I'll bite. If we don't tax income or goods, how do we fund the state government and its services?
We don't, then we blame the demoncrats when life sucks
You’re downvoted for the truth. Americans #1 expense is taxes. Income tax began as a temporary measure. Low income shouldn’t even pay income tax imo
Lol, america isn’t even close to one of the most taxed nations on earth and we’ve got the inferiority in quality of life ratings to prove it. There’s no polite way to say this so I won’t dance around it: you don’t know what you’re talking about.
I never said most taxed on Earth. I just said that taxation is the largest expense for Americans: fact. And that income tax was introduced as a temporary measure: fact. You can disagree but you can’t say I have no idea what I’m talking about.
Except no? The constitution doesn’t get amended with the intention of it being temporary. The 16th amendment could not be clearer.
And no, taxation is not the largest expense. As someone else pointed out, nearly half the country pays little to income tax. For the bulk of the middle class and even the upper class, it is maybe 25-30% of income.
Lol taxes are the biggest expense for Americans idk what to tell you. You could say that’s good or bad, and we could agree to disagree, but it’s true. Yes income tax was initially a temporary measure, then in 1913 a measure for the richest 1%.
There was income tax prior to 1913
And? That was temporary. Income tax, as established in in the 16th amendment, was meant to be permanent and expandable as necessary to fund the government.
And the fact you use a fact checker to go back n forth online is an L
Because I’m not going to type a big long thing about how wrong you are when someone else already did it for me. Cause make no mistake about it, you are embarrassingly wrong.
No I’m not
Low income people don't pay income tax lol
Like half of Americans pay 0 income tax
They do pay RI income tax. This is a RI subreddit correct?
Wait are you really going to say that you meant state income tax is a person's biggest expense? That 3.75% is the biggest line item in anyone's budget?
No I said taxes. Taxes as in all taxes combined
So then doesn't that invalidate what you just said about being in the RI subreddit and only talking about RI taxes?
How would McKee change federal income tax?
Changing the subject when clearly caught in a lie. Classic right wing tactic.
Bruh I’m not right wing. Nice Reddit logic, if someone disagrees with me they must be the opposite political party. You really think taxes aren’t too high?
>Bruh I’m not right wing
Didn't say you were
>must be the opposite political party
Ironic how you immediately assumed my party, after chastising me for doing so
>You really think taxes aren’t too high?
Overall? Nope. I've already outlined my thoughts in this thread.
But don't think you've successfully distracted from the fact that you made a false claim about tax expenses, then zig zagged back and forth whether you were talking about RI taxes or not. You're allowed to admit you were wrong and learned something, going through these theatrics to avoid correcting your initial claim just makes you look worse.
You’re a fool sorry man
Classic, resort to name-calling
Sorry I don’t want to argue over taxes online
Okay so then why did you start talking about them in the first place, then proceed to make a dozen comments more trying to cover for your fallacy?
Simply not talking was always an option.
Just make your income zero on paper and have all your money coming in from capital gains, much lower tax rate
Ok Martha Stewart
Taxation is theft.
Good. Try moving to Somalia then. No taxes, no regulations, and all the guns you can eat.
Nah I’m straight with that
My favorite part about libertarians is that you guys took “I don’t think there should be age of consent laws” and just built an entire ideology out from that
No one is advocating for crimes against children that is disgusting. I am talking about income tax.
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That’s super mean but much nicer than what others have previously said.
degggendorf t1_j4tdvgk wrote
Why even bother lowering the sales tax rate? I'm certainly not going to notice saving 0.15%, but the state will feel the hit in aggregate.
If they're willing to take in less sales tax, how about take in less by exempting more categories like OTC contraceptives?
I don't see any reason why the hypothetical $60,000 car needs to be 0.15% cheaper.